by Sydney Smith in St. Paul's Cathedral
on the Sunday after the Queen's accession.

The sermon is throughout a noble composition, grandly conceived and
admirably expressed. It begins with some grave reflections on the "folly
and nothingness of all things human" as exemplified by the death of a
king. It goes on to enforce on the young Queen the paramount duties of
educating her people, avoiding war, and cultivating personal religion.
It concludes with the following passage, which in its letter, or at
least in its spirit, might well find a place in some of to-morrow's
sermons:--"The Patriot Queen, whom I am painting, reverences the
National Church, frequents its worship, and regulates her faith by its
precepts; but she withstands the encroachments and keeps down the
ambition natural to Establishments, and, by rendering the privileges of
the Church compatible with the civil freedom of all sects, confers
strength upon and adds duration to that wise and magnificent
institution. And then this youthful Monarch, profoundly but wisely
religious, disdaining hypocrisy, and far above the childish follies of
false piety, casts herself upon God, and seeks from the Gospel of His
blessed Son a path for her steps and a comfort for her soul. Here is a
picture which warms every English heart, and would bring all this
congregation upon their bended knees to pray it may be realized. What
limits to the glory and happiness of the native land if the Creator
should in His mercy have placed in the heart of this royal woman the
rudiments of wisdom and mercy? And if, giving them time to expand, and
to bless our children's children with her goodness, He should grant to
her a long sojourning upon earth, and leave her to reign over us till
she is well stricken in years, what glory! what happiness! what joy!
what bounty of God! I of course can only expect to see the beginning of
such a splendid period; but when I do see it I shall exclaim with the
pious Simeon--'Lord, now lettest Thou Thy servant depart in peace, for
mine eyes have seen Thy salvation.'"

As respects the avoidance of war, the event has hardly accorded with the
aspiration. It is melancholy to recall the idealist enthusiasms which
preceded the Exhibition of 1851, and to contrast them with the realities
of the present hour. Then the arts of industry and the competitions of
peace were to supplant for ever the science of bloodshed. Nations were
to beat their swords into ploughshares and t